Shabbat Zakhor 5775: Confronting Today’s Amalek

I recently read Roz Chast’s memoir about the senescence and death of her parents entitled, “Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?” The title refers to her parents’ strident refusal, even in their mid-90s, to discuss their failing bodies and to prepare for the inevitable. The book is a brutally honest memoir by their daughter of the ways that she too avoided but then engaged with the pain, frustration, and sorrow of her parents’ final years.

It is hard to blame anyone for wanting to avoid discussing the “unpleasant” parts of life, even though responsible adults and also children are generally better off when confronting the reality before them with candor. Two researchers, Peter Dodds and Chris Danforth, have developed what they call a “hedonometer” to monitor pleasure in millions of human expressions (in print media, Twitter, etc.). The most widely reported result so far is their “Geography of Happiness,” but as John Tierney discusses this week in the Science Times, they also show that people have a persistent tendency to frame their lives in positive terms, even when discussing negative events. He writes, “When terrorists commit an atrocity, we quickly respond with prayers and donations for the victims. Journalists covering the devastation of an earthquake look for stories of heroic rescue workers and of victims found alive in the rubble. Even when a bad event is being described, there can be an effort to counteract its impact by using positive language.”

In other words, when horror confronts us, we have a strong instinct to find the silver lining—the redemptive elements even in catastrophe. The researchers speculate that this could be an adaptation—maintaining a positive outlook in life is an attractive feature that can help a person find a mate. But I suspect that this is also a strategy for maintaining mental health. When life seems chaotic and threatening, a person may be tempted to become inactive. Grasping for even small elements of hope can help a person become active so that they may address a threatening situation rather than waiting for it to get worse. Still, it cannot be a positive adaptation to ignore real threats and pretend that they don’t exist.

The common predisposition to ignore or soft-pedal painful realities is my “kavanah” or meditation while approaching Shabbat Zakhor. The Torah commands Israel to, “remember that which Amalek did to you on your way out of Egypt…don’t forget.” This command to remember was listed as a positive commandment by medieval mitzvah counters such as Rambam (Aseh #189) and the Sefer HaHinukh (#605). The Talmud and early Midrashim ask the reasonable question of what does it mean to “remember”? Can this be accomplished “in the heart”? The rabbis conclude that the end of the passage, which adds, “and don’t forget,” refers to the heart, so the first command must call for something more expressive—remember with your mouth and don’t forget in your heart. Thus, the command to speak about Amalek’s treachery explicitly in public, and in doing so, never to forget.

While this mitzvah could be fulfilled at any time, it was built into our liturgy through the Mishnah’s mandate to read the passage in Deuteronomy as a special maftir on the Shabbat before Purim (M. Megillah 3:4), and to add as a special Haftarah the account from First Samuel in which the prophet appoints Saul as king and in the next sentence says that God remembers (פָּקַדְתִּי) what the Amalekites did.

Those of us who attend services this Shabbat will fulfill the mitzvah by listening to the maftir, and on Purim, we will expand upon it by reading the story of Amalek’s descendant Haman, and jeering at his name. Yet I do not think that we will have fully satisfied our obligation with such formulaic responses. Unfortunately, the memory of Amalek is not merely a matter of ancient history. We are living at a time when genocidal hatred is chillingly evident. We can discuss milder forms of anti-Semitism and other bigotries that remain persistent in American society. However, the truly terrifying level of hatred in our day is being expressed by the Islamic State and its sympathizers around the globe.

It has been tempting for Americans, weary from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, to turn away from the alarming developments in Syria and Iraq, and “talk about something more pleasant.” It is also tempting to dismiss IS (or ISIS or ISIL) as “just a bunch of terrorists,” and not to take them seriously as a mass movement that is intent on reestablishing the Islamic caliphate, and has developed an millenarian ideology that valorizes mass executions and martyrdoms as a means to provoke an apocalypse. Every day we hear of additional atrocities–mass murders, enslavements, amputations and generally thuggish behavior typical of the greatest villains in history.

The cover story of the current Atlantic magazine is an important article by Graeme Wood called, “What Isis Really Wants.” I cannot say that this is pleasant reading, but I think it mandatory for each of us to educate ourselves about this group, which has already greatly surpassed Al Qaeda in establishing sovereign territory, coherent leadership and mass appeal from around the globe, including from our own city, given this week’s arrests of three aspiring jihadists in Brooklyn.

I should make explicit what I am not calling for. The reading of ancient texts and of contemporary journalism is not meant to activate our communities to express intolerance or, God forbid, violence against other people. On the contrary, I feel that our purpose must be to seek out members of other faith communities, including Muslims, to discuss these disturbing times and to form alliances to support diverse societies and human rights. Graeme Wood notes that the dominant expression of Salafi ideology in our time is more introspective, even if it is not truly tolerant or pacific towards people of other faiths (or even Muslims of other sects). We should encourage our elected officials to stay focused on these threats and take appropriate action to oppose them. These means strengthening the hands of moderates, and undermining the genocidal fanatics however possible.

As we approach Shabbat Zakhor, we do not have the option of avoiding the most frightening and dangerous developments of our time. Remember what Amalek did back then, pay attention to what his spiritual heirs are up to today—do not be silent, and do not despair.